Identification And Species Delimitation Of The Enigmatic Marsh Frog Pulchrana Rawa (Matsui, Mumpuni, And Hamidy, 2012): Second Confirmed Specimen And First Country Record For Malaysia

Pulchrana rawa is a peat swamp specialist that was described from eastern Sumatra in 2012 based on a single specimen. Since then, no confirmed records have been forthcoming; thus, virtually nothing is known about this species. Recent fieldwork at peat swamp forests in southwestern Peninsular Malaysia led to the discovery of a frog that morphologically resembled P. rawa. Despite having relatively high mitochondrial divergence (6.6%) that was consistent with interspecific divergences of other closely related species, results from species delimitation analyses indicated that the Malaysian specimen was conspecific with P. rawa. In addition to extending the geographic distribution of this species to a different country, we also provide the first quantitative characterization of its call. This study provides novel insights into the distribution and natural history of this enigmatic species that will inevitably aid in threat assessments and conservation efforts.